In a variety of contexts, it is desirable to remotely monitor a patient via a data or other network. In particular, with the recent expansion of data communication networks, such as the Internet and the associated World Wide Web, remote patient monitoring has become an increasingly viable health care option. In this regard, a medical monitoring device may be interconnected to data communications networks, such as the Internet, to transmit patient data to a remote user who is also interconnected to that data communications network. These remote patient monitoring systems allow, inter alia, physician access to geographically remote patients as well as at home monitoring for non-critical patients.
Generally, existing medical monitoring devices that provide information about one or more of a patient's physiological parameters do not have the ability to connect to a data communications network for remote monitoring purposes. In this regard, these medical monitoring devices typically either are not used for remote medical monitoring, or, if any networking capability is provided for any purpose, these devices generally require interconnection to a separate device that provides an interface to the data communications for transmitting data to a predetermined location.